Iran Blamed For Major Cyberattack On BBC

Qedward writes "Iran is privately being blamed for a major cyberattack on the BBC that blocked access to its popular Persian TV service and disrupted the Corporation's IT using a denial-of-service attack. The multi-pronged March 2 attack took down much of the BBC's email, overloaded its telephone switchboard with automatic phone calls, and blocked a satellite feed for the BBC Persian station. BBC servers were also on the receiving end of a DDoS. In an unprecedented tactic, the BBC has trailed a speech to be given this week to the Royal Television Society in which Director General Mark Thompson will mention the attacks in some detail while stopping short of formally naming Iran as the perpetrator."

Comments

Beats real war any day

[elrous0]

I'd rather have countries launching lame DDoS's than launching missiles.

And I wouldn't mind living in a world where everyone put down their guns and just started being dicks to each other on the internet instead. Besides, in that world, all us losers on /. could finally be the badass war heroes who women want to sleep with.

Of course, most will probably just use both the internet AND their guns/missiles.

Re:Beats real war any day

[Anonymous Coward]

oh lets see, USA vs. Hitler, Moussolini, Stalin (Cold War), North Korea, I think if Iran is all about good and against evil (as you seem to claim) they all falling far behind in achievements; thank god for USA, the world would be a very sad place come 1945. Have your pick Europeans: Hitler's goons or Stalin's. Same in Asia.

Re:Beats real war any day

[Anonymous Coward]

The US Funded the Mujhadeen, the Vietcong, Saddam Hussein, Israel, the IRA, and god knows what else.

Re:Beats real war any day

[Anonymous Coward]

This post is so full of ignorance it's pathetic. Learn some history outside your bubble man, it's making you look sad.

Re:Beats real war any day

[Sir_Sri]

Unlikely. The British empire combined with the SU would have defeated Germany and Italy. The issue is more the state of europe at the end of it all. One can reasonably presume the soviets would have been farther west and the british not as far east proportionately. But without the US the war might have taken a very different flavour, the british forming the southern or northern flanks of a combined operation, that sort of thing. Africa would have probably ended up basically the same, given that the British controlled the med and the surface of the atlantic by the time the US entered the war. Asia is a different mess, because the US and britain entered the war at the same time. I'm not sure the Japanese could have gone after the allies minus the US in quite so grandiose a way.

From the moment the germans failed to force the soviets to capitulate in barbarossa they were doomed (and that was about 3 weeks after the US entered the war, so not much the US did). How europe would have been carved up between the british and soviets would have been very different without the americans on the british side to be sure.

Besides that, it's sort of a nonsense statement. A lot has happened since 1945. 70 years before WW2 the world looked at germany as a beacon of political progress. Just because the US picked the right war 70 years ago doesn't mean it was right or wrong about anything in particular that has happened since. If you really want to air 70 year old dirty laundry why did the US do bugger all when their oldest friend was being marched over by the Nazi's? Right. Being right once doesn't make you always right.

Britain and france were on the right side of WW2 also, and what did that get them. Suez, Algeria, Vietnam etc. etc. aren't exactly beacons of justice, and the US has just as much dirty laundry post ww2 as they do.

Re:Beats real war any day

[cpu6502]

>>>who had a growing influense over Mosaddeq.

False.

Saying Mosaddeq was communist is like the idiots who claim Obama is communist. There's no truth to it. (And even if either of those 2 things were true, that's what elections are for: So the people can remove the president. No need for outside military interference.)

Re:Beats real war any day

[NeutronCowboy]

They didn't create the Taliban, but they supported the same exact people who turned into the Taliban or warlords of varying degrees of acceptability.

It's completely disingenuous to argue that because the Taliban didn't formally exist until the withdrawal of the Soviet Union, the US couldn't have had a hand in creating them. The only reason we don't like the Taliban right now is because they're fighting us instead of someone we don't like. That's it. If the Taliban would be fighting Al Qaeda, we wouldn't care how many girls they keep out of schools, or how many people they execute for blasphemy. But since they don't, we pretend we do.

So don't even try the argument that the US somehow didn't support the same people we're trying to kill now. The only thing that has changed is who the Taliban are against. And it just so happens to be us.

Re:Beats real war any day

[NeutronCowboy]

You missed the point. It is hypocritical of you if the only time you dislike rapists is when they rape you, but you are fine if they are raping someone else.

Re:Beats real war any day

[cavreader]

It doesn't matter who provided weapons and miltary support for those fighting the USSR. Pakistan, England, and Saudi Arabia contributed way more military assistance than the US while the US got stuck with paying for the refugee camps. They Taliban made their own choice to use the weapons on their own population all by themselves. The accusation of US military support is just as much BS as the US given Iraq large amounts of weapons in the Iran-Iraq war when they actually supplied less than 2% of the total. There is no point in the US government even recognizing Afghanistan since there is nothing to gain. It would actually save a ton of money by letting them do whatever the hell they want to on their own dime. The US can also ignore Iran and let their neighbors deal with them. Saudi Arabia and Bahrain have certainly purchased enough cutting edge military technology from the US and it's time for them to use it if they feel threatened. Let them deal with Syria all by themselves if the are so outraged. The only thing the US has every provided these countries is a focus point to blame the US for all their troubles. After the US leaves they can get back to killing each other in peace just like Iraq and if we are lucky the might eliminate each other all by themselves while also depriving them of using the west as an excuse. The US also has no business getting involved in the Israeli-Palestinian never ending cluster fuck. The Palestinians have as much chance of recovering territory as Mexico would have trying to re-take Texas or California. Every time they have tried to force the issue the have been bitch slapped by the Israelis. The most important thing the US has contributed in this never ending conflict is keeping Isreal from finishing the job once and for all. Isreal could have flattened Cairo and Damascus in 1973 if the US had not pressured them to stop. The Israel-Palestinian conflict has never been about land it's been about the surrounding Arab countries trying to undo the humiliation they have suffered every time they have tried to use their state militarises. 1973 was especially humiliating because the Arabs had total surprise, the latest Russian technology, and more soldiers and equipment. The conflict has also created a group of very wealthy people directing the Palestinians sitting in their villas in Lebanon. End the conflict and these people lose money. Arafat died a billionaire by stealing aid money targeted to help the Palestinians. While he was playing liberator of the downtrodden his wife was living it up in their fancy residence in France. And while the US might supply some military systems today Isreal has a very advanced domestic military industry of their own. They know without a doubt that they can not trust anyone, including the US, to come to their aid so they have developed most of their own weapons themselves to lower the risk. Iran should also be thinking of ways to solve this nuclear issue or Isreal is liable to give them a couple for free and the only consequences Israel would face is a strong worded statement from the UN. Personally I don't care if Iran does have nuclear weapons because if they actually used one Iran would be a smoking radioactive crater about 30 minutes later. I wouldn't be surprised if Isreal did not already have the coordinates of every major middle eastern capital hardwired into their nukes to make sure any nuclear attack on their tiny country would take everyone in the region down with them regardless of who fired the first shot. What would they have to lose in such a scenario?

Pure propaganda.

[Beelzebud]

Anyone else sick of these re-runs? For the past month the anti-Iranian propaganda has really ratcheted up. We're seeing the same tactics they used to scare the public in to supporting an invasion of Iraq.

Re:Pure propaganda.

[daveschroeder]

Is there a world where you can imagine that the US would actually do something right (including exercise force), or that Iran might actually be doing something wrong?

Or is this just all an intellectual exercise in moral relativism, where the US is always "in the wrong" or that any other nation has a "right" to do whatever they wish?

Why must this be obviously NOT an Iranian cyber attack (and attribution is admittedly anything but certain), and must instead be some kind of subterfuge?

When the US entered World War II, did we do the "right thing", or was that also wrong? Who should have won? When is it okay to protect our interests?

Re:Pure propaganda.

[cpu6502]

Therefore we should cut-off food and starve 1 million Iranians just like we starved 1 million Iraqis during the 1990s embargo. And when that doesn't work (because it won't), we should bomb the hell out of them and kill (or maim) another 1 million innocent men, women, and children like we did in Iraq in 2002 to 2011.

Why don't we listen to the head of Israel's Mossad who said, "Iran is not an existential threat to us." Therefore there's no need for us to go over there and start starving or outright killing people. I don't understand this desire of the U.S. or its people to hold the record for the most corpses created during the last three decades. It reminds me of how another nation circa 1931 to 39. (No not Germany..... Japan in China, Taiwan, and Vietnam because they needed oil and natural resources.)

Re:Pure propaganda.

[Ihmhi]

Is there a world where you can imagine that the US would actually do something right (including exercise force),

Yes. It's a daring plan I call "Operation: Stay the Fuck Out of Other Countries Because That's None of Our Goddamned Fucking Business."

...I have a committee working on a better name.

Re:Pure propaganda.

[daveschroeder]

Funny, but if you actually think the world would be a better place for humanity at large if nations throughout the last couple of centuries which have stood for principles of freedom over the alternatives did nothing, I think you'd be unpleasantly surprised at the result.

And if you think that nations which are manifestly NOT free are isolating themselves and standing still, you'd be sadly mistaken. I'm always amused at the effects of the lens through which many view their own country, and how ignorant people are of threats in the world.

Re:Pure propaganda.

[NeutronCowboy]

Oh hi - I was wondering where you had gone to. Seems not much has changed. Still supporting government jack boots in all their forms.

Note sure what you're trying to show with your two posts, because they pretty much make the case that
a) we're seeing the same exact events unfold now with Iran that unfolded with Iraq
b) the US position on Iraqi WMDs has been conclusively shown to be wrong

You can try to argue all you want that "the truth pointed to WMDs", but the actual truth was that Iraq didn't have nukes (only chemical weapons we had sold them), the intelligence reports presented to policy makers were selected to present a particular viewpoint, and did not reflect the consensus of the intelligence analysts. Furthermore, you are wrong when you state that many other intelligence agencies supported the conclusions of the american ones. They didn't. The French specifically stated that Iraq probably didn't have any WMDs, and the Germans were skeptical as well. Sorry I don't have any links - I don't save links from about 10 years ago. But I - and a lot of other people who didn't rely on US press - knew that in 2001-2003, the US executive was flat out lying about Iraq's WMD plans.

Finally, even your last paragraph neatly fits into the run up to the Iraq war. There as well, the final fall-back argument was "well, Saddam is evil, and we aren't, so we should support the plans to invade Iraq, because if we don't, Evil will win".

It's absolutely fucking eerie that you can sit here and make the same arguments, almost verbatim, and act surprised that everyone thinks you're lying. The worst part is: Iran IS working towards a nuke. But you are exactly the reason that they are working towards a nuke, because they saw what happened when you just bluff about having nukes: you get invaded. But if you have a nuke, and can point it at Tel-Aviv - well, chances, are you won't. So yes - I'm flat out blaming you, your entire rhetorical structure and everyone you got your ideas from for trying to start another war in the Middle East.

And this time, it won't go nearly as well. Not only is our military overstretched, but there is nothing to achieve there outside of an ideological win: an Iran without a nuke. Even if we win, the cost will be astronomical compared to the actual prize. And if we lose.... yeah, was nice knowing you, USA.

TL;DR: Fuck off with your rhetoric of inevitable war. It has always lead to a disaster. It's stupid from a realpolitik perspective, and it's even worse from an ideological perspective.

Re:FOR AMERICA WAR IS PEACE MORE THAN ANY OTHER VA

[Rakishi]

evil International Communist Conspiracy, which in fact never existed, evil or not.

If you think the Soviet Union wasn't using every dirty trick they knew to get pro-communists in power in those same countries you listed then you're delusional. Also, if you don't think they have done every legal and illegal thing they could have to maintain their hold over those "democratic" communist parties you're even more delusional. Of course, the Soviets had no legal mandate to ever release their records of such things.

So yes there was a conspiracy in the same way as there was a giant pro-US conspiracy, a giant game of chess played across the globe at hideous cost.